What do ya think, about 10 more of these and I should have quite a openings for some homeless crappie. These have a nice wide base on them so they should sit upright when I sink them. Only bad part right now is that the lakes are so low If I set them out now, they may be in too deep of water if it ever does rain.

Looks great i Am working one some right now. Did you buy all of that PVC or do you have a source?

Man that looks like an excellent design..Only thing I don't like about jigging is getting hung up in the limbs. That's not gonna happen with your straight up pvc design..Looks like a crappie hotspot already..

Thankfully I didnt have to buy all that pvc, I design the equipment used in manufacturing pvc and Polyethlene pipe, and a customer sent us some pipe to test a machine with. The Ironic part is I've been doing this for 9 years now and this is the first time I have been able to get my hands on some Free PVC, lol. As far as the design, it is not mine, But I did come up with a brilliant idea of useing a 5 gal bucket split down one side and bottom for a mold, as far as I know. Now If I could just hurry the curring of the concrete up.

Looks nice! Imagine what the neighbors might think if they looked over the fence if they were non-fishermen. They would be wondering, "what the heck are you doing?"

I'm waiting a bit for lake levels to come back before I set out any condos.

Take care!

Stake beds...Ernest and Guy set out one huge stake bed somewhere in LL. I remember the story they told about a pre-dawn encounter with a parks guard at the ramp on that one!

Definitely want to wait for water levels to improve before setting stake beds!!! Those appear to be between 5-6 foot high?

Remember to take the handles off the 5-gal buckets (hook hang-up potential).

Redfin's Law: if there's a chance that a 1/16th oz. jig can hang-up in a 1/16" diameter hole drilled in a vertical surface, it will.

If you walk around you lakes when they are low you can find a lot of PVC that has broken off from peoples drainage and scrapes that they left out their after they where finished working on it.

Looks like the beach at Normandy on D-Day.

Drop a bunch of those in one spot and I'd think that would be ONE SWEET SPOT!

How much concrete are you putting in each bucket?

Whats the story with the Park Guard?

about how tall are these condos 3, 4, 5 feet or taller. You wound figure working with that stuff all of the time that you could get your hands on it at will. Sometime things aren't what they appear.lol. God bless

The bucket is just a mold for the concrete to sit in. I know what you mean about getting hung up though.

About 2-1/2 to 3" deep , The trick was to drill a 1/8" through the pipe at one end and a tap a nail through it as a anchor, so as it wont pull out of the contrete.

I have cut them at 4' lengths so laying at a slant like that there a little shy of 4'

Crappie_fan

You mentioned about needing concrete set up faster. Have you tried the Quick crete I have used it and it sets fast. There are different types for different uses so check closely. I set some vollyball net poles and they were ready in a couple hours
Tom H.

I can pretty much tell you what the neighbors say when they look over your backyard fence and see a yard full of those things, cause I had a yard full about a year ago. It was sorta fun. Whenever they would ask what it was, I'd say "stakebed condos". Not wanting to be thought of as non-informed; they'd smile, shake their heads and say....really. Totally clueless.

Guy,

I know the feeling.........my neigbors probaly think I am building some really tacky looking abstract art. And if the condos sit in the backyard for more than a week - my wife will suggest I might want to go to the lake.

put baking soda in concrete sets up lot quicker use 1/4 to 1/2 cup when mixing all up